Predictable Pattern

Citation:  Beaumont, K. (2008) . Who ate all the cookie dough? New York. USA: Henry             Holt and Company.   

ISBN #:  978-0-8050-8267-8

Content of the story: 

A Kangaroo is making cookies, but someone has eaten all the cookie dough!  She goes to each of her friends looking for who ate it all.  The friends ask each other if they were the one who ate the cookie dough.  This book rhymes and also has predictable patterns in it. The children can guess and use reasoning about who ate the cookie dough.

The reason for three to five year olds: 

Three to five year olds would love this book. It is simple to read, with not too many words on each page. The story rhymes and so they will have some idea of what’s to come next. The illustrations are beautifully done. In the end, the children can guess who ate all the cookie dough before you flip the page.

Illustration comments: 

These are really lively pictures. The main focus on each page, are the characters. There are very simple background pictures. Each time you flip over the page, a new character joins the kangaroo in her search. The colors are bright and go well together.

Provocation: 

Set out a large bowl with a spoon in it where the children can see it clearly. There would be a sign above it that says, “Who ate all the cookie dough?” and a picture of Kangaroo. A teacher wear an apron(possibly brown) with a pocket with baby kangaroo in  and hair band with kangaroo ears. 

Presentation:  

1. Read this story to the children first.  Stop where the animals wonder who ate all the dough.  Say, "I wonder who?"  Since all the animals are on that page, children can wonder which animal ate the dough.

2. Read the story with finger puppets of lion, zebra, llama, cheetah, and hippo.  Also make a monkey finger puppet to hang from the a loop around one of the fingers since the monkey is hanging from the tree in the book. Make mama kangaroo puppet with a big pocket, and inside the pocket, put the baby kangaroo.  As each animal come up in the story, show each finger puppet.  At last, hang the monkey from one of the fingers.  Then when the mama kangaroo comes back in the story, use the mama kangaroo puppet.  Wonder with children who ate all the cookies.  And take a baby kangaroo and cookies.  (They can eat the cookie for a snack)

3. Prepare story basket, however, use a basket  or even a bag that you can put around your waist, and hide all the animals.  As you read the story, you take each one of them from the pocket.  Finally, the baby one comes out at the end.    

Extension: 

1.    Bring the ingredients in to make cookies with the children. Then make cookies together in class.

2.    Tell the story by giving a few children masks of the characters, and they would act it out as I read the story.  Each child who had a mask, as they were called out, would hold hands with the other children who had already been called. (eg. Kanga asks lion, then they both ask zebra…and so on).

3.    Reading the story “If you give a mouse a cookie.”